Isn't there some base number it has to hit by August to go until November? Cause it doesn't look like its gonna hit that number at this point no matter how low it ends up being. I wonder, since clearly nothing's been put into prototype phase yet, if there's a "tier 1 vs tier 2" kind of option that could happen? Like rolling, 4 opening doors, hood & trunk w roll out pack carrier but no lights or sounds for something closer to $100. Cause I honestly don't think anyone gives more of a shingbling about electronics than they do $115. I don't need it to do any of that stuff. I saw what the "ghosts" inside the ecto goggles look like and if that's the level of technology they're trying to put in this thing, I'm POSITIVE I will never even bother buying batteries for it. I want a movie accurate ecto-1 for displaying my ghostbusters in. If I needed it to be that spot on, I wouldn't have bought the stay puft for $80 that was 80% smaller than it should have been. Haha, can you imagine what a 100 inch stay puft with glowing red face feature would have cost using the mattydollar currency conversion? Wow.

_________________The fact that humans think they're the only animals with souls makes them the most soulless animals of all.

There's nothing in the terms and conditions about having to hit a initial number in August before being extended to November. From the moment they revealed this at SDCC and then listed it for pre-order on the website, the deadline was November 5. Their pre-order page says "The Ecto-1 vehicle will only be produced if the minimum pre-order goal is reached by November 5, 2013."

Sadly, there's no Tier 1 vs. Tier 2 option either. It's all or nothing for this, unless they decide to change the rules later on. I'd say if it's not past the halfway mark on that meter by September, we should get worried.

I agree with your opinion about the electronics. I could easily live without the lights and sound effects if it meant getting this for $100 less and having a better chance of it reaching its pre-order goal. I just want a proper scaled vehicle to display with the figures. For me, this is going to be like a diorama display piece for the figures to pose in front of -- not a kid's toy, so why add pricey gimmicks like sound effects if it's going to jeopardize the release of this item? If it's still in an early prototype stage, they'd be wise to ditch the electronics and cut the price.

Okay, forget what I said above. I guess they neglected to update their terms and conditions on the pre-order page with the revised deadline date (false advertising, eh?). I just saw Matty's (Toy Guru's) post on Facebook which states:"Aug 19th is the DEADLINE for both subs and hitting the bare minimum on the Ecto 1. While we hope to keep the Ecto 1 presale open longer after Aug 19th to gain additional presales, if we don’t hit the minimum by Aug 19th, the Ecto 1 will also close down."

Well so much for that. I guess we're not going to get an Ecto-1. Just look at the meter as of today. There's no way in hell the Ecto-1 will hit the goal in 3 weeks time.

Now I could understand the short term deadline for the MOTUC and DCUC subscriptions, since their first figures need to be released in January -- but why cut the deadline short for the Ecto-1 when we know it's release date wasn't going to be until next Fall, more than a year from now? The pre-order has only been up for a week and a half now. It's barely had any chance to gain word-of-mouth online and attract other buyers. I swear, Matty's expectations are just so rediculously high when it comes to any of their online-exclusive toy lines. Why even bother offering them in the first place, when they seem determined to kill a great idea before it has a real chance to thrive? It's like they deliberately just set themselves up for failure, and then cluelessly throw all the blame on us.

I notice you all talking about not having the lights & sounds to get the price down on this thing. Well I don't know for sure but if the electronics inside are anything like the Hoverboard. That's not going to save much money in general. But mattel don't want you to know that anyway.

Here's the way I see it. Mattel throws in some $2 electronics for lights & sound only to try & brainwash the consumers buying into that this cheap toy is actually worth $215, plus probably $40 shipping ( more for international ) & $15 dollars tax. By the time it's all said & done you're paying close to $300 for this thing. Is it really worth it, hell no IMHO.

The 60's batmobile for the 6 inch figures is $40 at Target or $50 at Toys R Us. That's with retailers making a profit in the mix. So after mattel produces it, sells it to retailers while making profit, then the retailers sell it to us & make a profit, this thing is still $40 to $50. Why is the Ecto-1 so much then? Oh, Toy Guru will tell you it's a limited run & collector market & retail are different, blah,blah,blah & blow all kinds of other smoke up your tail that no one should believe. Because you have to be an imbecile to actually believe that the toy cost THAT much more to produce because of the lower production run. Yes a lower quantity run cost more to produce, but not the difference in price of $40 to $215? So they throw cheap $2 electronics to have more to say about why the are justifying that ridiculously inflated price. Obviously some of you aren't buying the fact that the lights & sound make it worth $215 & would rather do without them. Now this next part, I do not know the actual percentages. These are all just examples being thrown out. So the mattel kool aid drinkers calm down & don't get your panties in a bunch. mattel will not agree to eliminating the lights & sound because then they won't have an excuse that possibly some people might buy into, for an 85% mark up on this toy. They would be selling it at a more fair price & only making say 40% mark profit margin. Still a nice profit but not in the greedy eyes of mattel.

That can explain some of the price difference between the Batmobile and the Ecto-1.

All that video explained to me is that the Ecto-1 will probably be almost as cheaply made, but they try to blow smoke up our tails to justify the ridiculously over inflated price by saying their typical excuse " it was a low production run & it costs much more money to produce "

As for the video, Thanx to Pixel Dan for reveiwing this toy. I just think He was expecting too much from this " adult collectable. " I mean we are talking about mattel here. A company that released an " actual prop replica " hoverboard for $150 that was just cheap junk. Same thing poor quality with cheap electronics. Did we really expect this Batmobile to be that high quality? Maybe it's just me, but I have come to expect inferior garbage products from mattel. When I heard mattel was selling this thing for $50, I expected even less. I kind of thought that it would have no bottom like the Mego version of this same Batmobile.....lol So I was pleasantly surprised that it actually had a molded bottom . Man I shouldn't have posted that, don't be surprised now if the $215 Ecto-1 has no bottom since I just gave mattel an idea to cut more corners to make more profit

Over all, I really do like the look of this Batmobile. It probably only cost mattel $5 to produce these things, though. But we should be used to being taken by them by now. It's really a shame they can't just lose these licenses already.

Remind me to never use you to estimate production costs ever--- You get economy of scale discounts-- but get serious...-- its not like those things are DVDs.. The Packaging itself (including the ship cases and the actual packaging with the window boxes)- probably runs at least 3.50..

Im a Mattel distruster as well-- but production costs are one of the things I can rationalize..

_________________Fastest know derailer of threads in the know universe...expanded or otherwise.

The point I was trying to make with the video was showing a $50 car with no special features at all other than the wheels roll and it apparently has seat belts. The Ecto-1 would have 5 opening doors, a slide-out rack and all of that junk on the roof. The thing would be at least 6-8 inches longer than the Batmobile and it's not an open canopy car. Considerably more tooling, larger molds and the engineering time needed to make everything work together. Considerably more complicated than the simple Batmobile we've gotten (though it may feel cheap, the photos in this thread prove that the thing at least looks good).

I got you, Jim, I get that there will be a lot more work put into this thing, I just don't see it being $165 more work, which means if the value of the Batmobile seems sketchy, the value of the Ecto-1 will probably end up being even sketchier. If I buy a crappy $1 burger from Wendy's and it tastes like a crappy $1 burger, whatever my expectations of it were, I am aware that I got what I paid for. But if for some ridiculous reason I bought one of their "big expensive burgers" with bacon and cheese and extreme chipotle mayo and texas tonion barbeque flavor petals and extra sides and tried to make a meal out of it, once I started eating it i'd be furious with myself because I essentially just paid $10 for a crappy $1 burger. Maybe that's not the best analogy, but my concern is that if Mattel is willing to sell that for $50, what are they really going to do to make Ecto-1 worth $215? it would have to be over 4x superior a product JUST TO BE AS CRAPPY as the Batmobile. Nonetheless, I am stupidly putting faith in the idea that I'm going to squee like a girl when I actually get it in my hands, so I preordered the whole works anyhow. I do very much wish they'd leave the vroom and siren noises and lights off and charge $50 less for it. THAT would be absolutely worth it for me, even if it did end up just being a glorified version of the Kenner one.

_________________The fact that humans think they're the only animals with souls makes them the most soulless animals of all.

I am stupidly putting faith in the idea that I'm going to squee like a girl when I actually get it in my hands, so I preordered the whole works anyhow.

LOL

shishalzafrazz wrote:

I do very much wish they'd leave the vroom and siren noises and lights off and charge $50 less for it. THAT would be absolutely worth it for me, even if it did end up just being a glorified version of the Kenner one.

When did Matty throw that additional deadline in on this? When the pre-order first went up, it only listed the November 5 date. Now there's a magic number to hit before the deadline? That doesn't even make any sense. What difference does it make if the number is met by August 19 or November 5 as long as the minimum number is met?

I wonder if Mattel has realized yet that cutting the original November deadline back to August actually discourages potential subscribers rather than scaring them into signing up. Giving this thing a whopping FOUR weeks to suceed just makes it impossible, and therefore many people who were on the fence about pre-ordering it just had their decision made for them by Mattel. They realized it has no chance in hell of happening within 4 weeks time and therefore concluded "Why bother signing up? Going to fail anyway."